Featured Image Credit: BBC
Topics: TV and Film, BBC
Jess Hardiman
The creator of the fake BBC quiz show where a contestant’s head explodes has responded to the backlash from the episode.
BBC viewers were in for a bit of a shock recently as they watched a new quiz show end with a contestant's head exploding last Thursday (18 May).
In a change to the usual schedule, people were treated to the sight of popular comedian Lee Mack challenging three teams of three players in quiz show 3 by 3.
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Except it wasn’t really a quiz show: it was actually the latest offering from Inside No 9, the marvellously macabre series from Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton.
As the episode progressed, it became clear that something was ever so slightly off with the Oakwood family – or at least contestants Margaret (Gemma Page) and Catherine (Saskia Wakefield), as cricket-loving dad Stephen (James Tucker) was frozen out early on and never returned.
Despite revealing she’d had basically no experience with entertainment or much of the outside world, Catherine somehow seemed to be able to answer every question.
And our suspicions turned out to be correct, as she ended up blowing up her mother’s head in homage to the likes of Matilda and Carrie after it was heavily implied her parents had kept her locked up as an experiment.
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Naturally, the episode got a lot of tongues wagging after the latest episode took a ‘dark turn’, with many expecting the advertised On the Buses tribute episode which had just been a red herring.
But while some felt it was ‘one of the most intriguing episodes’ they’d seen, not everyone was impressed – not that Shearsmith seemed to care.
One tweeted: “@ReeceShearsmith the last episode was a clever idea, but I don't understand all the people who believed it was a real game show? You could obviously tell they were actors. One was quite a famous actor.”
Shearsmith then replied: “I guess not everyone is you Craig.”
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After Shearsmith shared a poster for the final episode – due to air this Thursday (25 May) - someone else wrote: “Well you left a lot of folks disappointed last week, gave a middle finger to vintage comedy fans who waited excitedly for the bus episode and just got a p**s poor quiz/Carrie mess.”
He responded with just one word: “Ha!”
Comedian and presenter Dara O Briain also piped up to say he ‘loved it’, to which Shearsmith replied: “Thanks so much Dara! It's certainly got people talking...!”
Another asked how much improv there had been from Lee Mack, who played the quiz show host.
“It was tightly written, it had to be for our story,” Shearsmith explained.
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“It looks spontaneous but was rigorously filmed. Lee improvised stuff all the way through as alternatives, just to keep it real.”
The final episode of season eight of Inside No 9 will be showing at 10pm on BBC Two on Thursday 25 May. All other episodes are available to watch on BBC iPlayer.